Safer migration for women

Just before Dasain this time last year, two young Nepali women were about to leave for Dubai. They were offered jobs to perform at cultural programs, but did not have proper travel documents.

One of them was a friend of Archana Darji, a journalist with our sister publication himalkhabar.com. As she writes in her blog, it was clear they were being trafficked by a gang of recruiters who had paid off Kathmandu airport immigration. 

The girls had to support their families, and were determined to go despite knowing the risks. One of them soon returned because she fell sick, and could not bring herself to tell Darji what the work was in Dubai. 

One year later, she has once more paid a recruiter for a job in Dubai, and is about to fly off again.

Most of the focus on overseas remittances gives credit to male migrant workers sending money home. The question around migrant women is often why they go despite knowing about exploitation and abuse. 

That is the wrong question. We know why. Instead, we should be asking what can be done immediately to ensure safe migration for Nepali women — both in Nepal and in destination countries.

In 2017, following high profile cases of abuse of women domestic migrant workers in West Asia, the government imposed a blanket ban on female migration. This misguided decision drove recruitment underground, forcing women to take unauthorised channels, increasing the risk of trafficking en route.

Many were stranded in Mumbai or Delhi, and being outside the safety net of Nepali embassies and consulates made their rescue and repatriation difficult.

A new study by Brunel University London calls for Nepali women migrants to be given skills-training and language orientation so they can migrate without being trafficked, exploited or abused. 

‘The ban overlooks evidence of positive outcomes for Nepali domestic workers and leads to several unintended and damaging consequences,’ the study says, adding there should be ‘concrete reintegration plans for returnee domestic workers at the local level of governance to assure their social, political and economic empowerment’.

The report's author Ayushman Bhagat, lecturer of Political Geography at Brunel, interviewed women including recent returnees in Jhapa. He found them distrustful and angry with the government for making it more difficult for them to migrate. 

“Instead of solving structural issues of class, caste, education, these women are having to bear the burden of historical marginalisation,” Bhagat told Nepali Times. “All they want is for their children to not have to lead the same life they did, and migration is the quickest way to their empowerment.”

Many women migrating for domestic work are at greater risk of being cheated by recruiters in Nepal, trafficked en route, and abused in destination countries. Even when they do return bearing the scars of abuse, they leave again out of sheer desperation.

Officially, one in every ten Nepali migrant workers is a woman but many more who are undocumented or migrate to India are not counted. Their contribution to the economy and family income is rarely acknowledged. 

This is hardly surprising, given the marginalisation Nepali women face at home, and the double discrimination women of excluded caste and ethnicities experience in society.

Over the years, the government has flip flopped on women migration, introducing shamefully restrictive and ad hoc gender-insensitive rules. One such regulation (later revoked after outrage, pictured) even required women under 40 to obtain permission letters from male family members and the local government for travel.

Part of the problem is the media’s doom and gloom portrayal of migration that magnifies the negative. 

True, there are harrowing cases of abuse and exploitation, and workers are cheated every step of the way, often by their own relatives and recruiters. But Bhagat says there are many other positive outcomes for women workers.

“We must highlight how the women are contributing to society, not everyone is being exploited and frankly to think otherwise is a very privileged mindset,” adds Bhagat.

Nepal’s graduation to middle income country is almost entirely supported by remittances reducing the poverty rate. Many returnees have improved family living standards, and created jobs for other Nepalis.

Restrictions and bans never work. Bhagat has some common sense steps to making migration safer for women:  

- Invite all women workers to register with Nepali missions regardless of their status with no repercussion.

- Strengthen the capacity of Nepali missions abroad to help workers in need at dedicated service centres.

- Form government-to-government legally binding arrangements for safe migration.

- Thoroughly vet new labour markets and regulate recruitment at the local levels.

Sonia Awale